NEW YORK - The digital divide was not on President Obama’s recent Latin American agenda but data shows when it comes to Internet Usage, Latin America and the Caribbean lag far behind their North American colleagues.
According to InternetWorldStats.com, the number of web users in the Latin/Caribbean region is just 34.5 percent, way behind the 77.4 percent in the U.S and Canada. In Latin America and the Caribbean, with a combined population of over 592 million, there are only over 204 million web users compared to over 266 million in North America. The United States leads with a whopping 220 million compared to Canada’s 28 million. In Latin America, Brazil is undoubtedly leading the way with over 67 million web users compared to just over 23 million in Mexico. Argentina is listed as having 20 million while Colombia has crossed the 13 million mark. Other Latin American nations do not even make the double digits. In the Caribbean, however, there is an estimated 10 million web users with just over 9 percent on Facebook. The Dominican Republic and Cuba lead the way with 3 million and 1.6 million Internet users as of last year. Jamaica has 1.5 while Puerto Rico has 1.2 million. Haiti was fifth overall with 1 million, in a country with a population of over nine million.
Trinidad & Tobago came the closest to Haiti with 485,000 users while Guyana had half of that number, with 220,000 in 2010.